BRUSSELS/ATHENS: Greece raised the stakes on Thursday in its quest for EU help to tackle its debt crisis, warning that it cannot achieve promised deficit cuts if its borrowing costs remain so high and may have to call in the IMF. The country, however, strongly denied a report that it was scheduled to turn to the international lender as soon as April

BAGHDAD: Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and main rival Iyad Allawi were locked in a close election race on Thursday, as updated results showed their blocs running neck-and-neck for seats in Parliament. Maliki's State of Law Alliance led the secular ex-Premier Allawi's Iraqiya list by just 40,000 votes nationwide, according to latest results which

GAZA: Palestinian militants launched their first deadly rocket attack on Israel in over a year, killing a Thai worker on Thursday in a strike that challenged Gaza's Hamas rulers and prompted Israel to threaten a powerful response. The rocket tore into a plastic-covered hothouse in the Israeli community of Netiv Haasara an hour after the European

ABUJA: Nigeria's Acting President Goodluck Jonathan will nominate a new ministerial team by next week, and is likely to reappoint around half the Cabinet he has just sacked, presidency sources said Thursday. Fast appointment of the ministers could do much to alleviate uncertainty in Africa's most populous nation after Jonathan dismissed

MOSCOW: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Russia on Thursday to clear obstacles to a new treaty cutting arsenals of nuclear weapons and to win Moscow's backing for tougher sanctions against Iran. Visiting UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, also in Russia for a Friday meeting of Middle East mediators, urged Russia and the United States

ANKARA: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan came under fire Thursday for his threat to deport thousands of illegal Armenian workers, with critics saying it damages the country's prestige and overshadows a limping peace process with Armenia. In comments late Tuesday, Erdogan said such action could be taken if foreign parliaments

NICOSIA: Cyprus President Demetris Christofias said Thursday he will not seek re-election in 2013 if he fails to reunify the Mediterranean island in UN-brokered peace negotiations. In a televised news conference to mark two years of his administration, Christofias said that if his key aim as president to solve the Cyprus problem is not achieved,

KHARTOUM: Sudan signed a ceasefire deal with a second Darfur rebel group Thursday, part of a government push to resolve the conflict in Sudan's violent west before elections next month. Government officials signed the deal with the Liberation and Justice Movement (LJM), an umbrella group of small factions, in Qatar, weeks after Khartoum inked a now faltering

TEHRAN: Iranian authorities have released on bail a top reformist jailed since last June, a film maker and a reformist journalist ahead of Iranian New Year celebrations, opposition websites said on Thursday. Mohsen Mirdamadi, former MP and secretary of Iran's largest reformist party, the Islamic Iran Participation Front, was released after posting bail

LAGOS: The speaker of Nigeria's senate has described Libya's leader Moammar Gadhafi as a "mad man" after he suggested splitting Nigeria between the Christian and Muslim communities to end sectarian violence. Responding to a point raised by a lawmaker in the upper house of Parliament, David Mark said that Gadhafi's comments were hardly worth dignifying

SANAA: Yemen will free northern Shiite rebel prisoners within days under a truce to end a war that drew in Saudi Arabia last year, an official said on Thursday, while clashes with armed separatists erupted in the south.
Separately, a US-born radical preacher, believed to be in hiding in southern Yemen where he has been targeted by air strikes,

BAGHDAD: Iraq has signed an agreement to receive the first of two $250-million loans from the World Bank to help the country plug its budget deficit, the Finance Ministry said Thursday. The announcement came around three weeks after the International Monetary Fund approved a $3.6-billion loan to the war-torn country.
"An agreement for a loan of $250 million

LONDON: The world may soon achieve something long dreamed of by governments and policymakers: higher economic growth without using more oil. Rising efficiency, conservation and substitution are steadily reducing the amount of oil needed to fuel an increase in the goods and services produced around the world. Oil demand in the rich, industrialized countries of the West

BRUSSELS/ATHENS: Greece raised the stakes on Thursday in its quest for EU help to tackle its debt crisis, warning that it cannot achieve promised deficit cuts if its borrowing costs remain so high and may have to call in the IMF. The country, however, strongly denied a report that it was scheduled to turn to the international lender as soon as April

BEIRUT: The Central News Agency said Thursday that the majority of candidates for the presidency of the Lebanese Industrialist Association may withdraw their nomination in favor of Nehmeh Frem, a prominent businessman who enjoys wide support from most political and economic groups. The elections are scheduled to be held on March 27.

BEIRUT: Figures released by the central bank show that the cumulative amount of subsidized interest loans to productive sectors in Lebanon reached $2.71 billion from 1997 until the end of September 2009, as reported by Lebanon This Week, the economic publication of the Byblos Bank Group. The industrial sector accounted for $1.6 billion, or 59 percent of the total,

BEIRUT: The huge number of French companies exhibiting at the Beirut International Exhibition and Leisure center (BIEL), for the French week in Lebanon 2010, is nothing less than a great indicator of the country's ability to once again become the commercial hub of the Middle East. "If it weren't for the political clashes that have occurred in Lebanon

BEIRUT: A closed-door meeting took place on Wednesday between the General Secretariat of the March 14 Forces and officials from the Phalange party, the daily An-Nahar reported. It said the two sides held in-depth discussions on controversial issues. In this respect, Ad-Diyar newspaper said the meeting was held at the Phalange party headquarters

BEIRUT: Dr. Garth Manning and Dr. Stella Major from the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) in the UK visited Lebanon from March 2-3 to assess how an efficient, operational system of family practitioners could be developed in Lebanon, the British Embassy said in a statement on Thursday. The visit was sponsored by the British Embassy.

BEIRUT: The committee charged with following up on the families of the victims of Ethiopian flight 409 met on Thursday with Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar to discuss legal procedures. It discussed with Najjar the implementation of the recommendations reached during two previous meetings with Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister

SIDON: Imagine after 12 years spent at medical school, the only job you can get is working as a builder on a construction site. This is one of many scenarios discussed by young Palestinian refugees during dialogue sessions held at the Ain al-Hilweh refugee camp in the south. The sessions were organized by the association for Palestinian refugees Raje.

SIDON: On the occasion of the upcoming Mother's Day celebration, the head of the parliamentary Education and Culture Committee, MP Bahia Hariri launched Thursday a music festival to honor Arab mothers and mothers all around the world. The festival was dubbed Oummi Sit al-Habayeb and formed part of the Beirut Festival for Cultural Values in Arab

SIDON: Most drivers in the southern coastal city of Sidon don't abide by the law issued by the Interior Ministry which requires the placement of a fire extinguisher in every car on Lebanese territories. This conclusion was drawn by The Daily Star upon the examination of a number of cars and trucks circulating in the main streets of the city.

No country can afford to ignore the lessons of the earthquakes in Chile and Haiti. We cannot stop such disasters from happening. But we can dramatically reduce their impact, if the right disaster-risk reduction measures are taken in advance. A week ago I visited Chile's quake zone and saw how countless lives were saved because Chile's leaders had

BEIRUT: Bassam Jalgha, 23, has decided he doesn't want a religious marriage. There's only one problem: civil marriages are not performed in Lebanon. Jalgha was one of around 200 people who marched on the Lebanese Parliament Thursday to demand politicians amend the law to allow people the option of marrying outside religious establishments.

KHARTOUM: It is hip hop night in the Sudanese capital and the crowd is ready to boogie as the DJ spins his turntable and the rapper from the war-torn Western Darfur region belts out his lyrics. The scene being played out in a Western cultural center in the heart of Khartoum would have been unimaginable after the Islamist-backed coup that brought President Omar al-Bashir

BERLIN: More than 200 items from the Aga Khan's collection of Islamic treasures are going on show in Berlin in an exhibition spanning a millennium and covering half the globe. A chestnut leaf delicately inscribed with golden calligraphy greets visitors at the start of the show of works collected by the billionaire philanthropist and illustrating the breadth of Islamic culture

The last week or so of Lebanese politics, if we can call it that, has had several moments of political fireworks, while seeing a few meaty issues arise.Last weekend, of course, saw a three-way drama: Walid Jumblatt gave his "long-awaited" interview and offered a mea culpa, of sorts, to his official Syrian audience. Naturally, the focus was on how Jumblatt explained his

A critical component of Indonesia's democratic future involves recognition of the special role of Islam in the state. Because most Indonesian Muslims want their government to respect Islamic customs even if they do not support the creation of an Islamic state, the line between support for and opposition to Islamic law is often blurred. Many Indonesians.

The United States and its Afghan and NATO allies have demonstrated unmistakable progress in Afghanistan this year. The ongoing Marja campaign, the arrest of Mullah Abdel-Ghani Baradar and two Taliban "shadow governors" in Pakistan, and the recent drone strike hitting top leaders of the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Haqqani network are all clear steps in the right direction.

After the failure of high-level talks between India and Pakistan over long running disputes, both countries are caught in an escalating proxy war in Afghanistan. If no solution is found to reconcile Pakistani and Indian interests in the country, the coming months might see stepped up terrorist attacks against Indians in Kabul and the return of militants infiltrating